Recently, I have been trying my best to educate myself on Social Networking strategies and what people are doing on the internet these days. I found myself at www.midem.com where I directed myself to a video entitled "Social Media: Strategy Tools For Artist Development".
There's a brief discussion in this video that mentions the Myspace age and the mentality that artists had to drive themselves at on the internet. Constantly hearing that the only thing labels were interested in was "How many views, plays, friends, etc. you had on Myspace." This brought back memories of when I used to run my bands Myspace page, constantly adding friends looked like a good idea, but as time went on, the relationships developed on Myspace became unnatural, minimal and irrelevant, being as most peoples friends lists started filling up with random people in Bikini's with "5K" posted in their username. To my relief, things have changed over the years, who'd have thought!?
While the labels, agents, managers, etc. are all making the Transition to the new world of Facebook, it's easy to see that some artists are falling a bit behind, still focusing on having the most "Likes" and the most "Followers", gaining distant relationships, and confusing Likes with die hard fans, which leaves most artists one step behind the rest of the industry.
What labels want is a strong community of fans who care. Having 1000 fans who don't read your status updates can not generate to enough revenue and interest to support the band. However, having 300 strong fans who constantly ReTweet, share your music, and post links to videos can play a huge roll in pushing the artist forward and getting their music out there to new people.
So if this sounds like you, spamming and constantly posting desperate claims to like your page, please stop. Let's step back, use time and effort, to gain a unique fan base in which you establish a real connection with, Develop a relationship, and build from there, give something to the people before demanding them to be interested in what you offer. Make them want to like you. In a day and age where it is so easy to get your music out there to people, it is crucial that you have people that are truly interested in your music, keep coming back, and keep sharing your tunes, because in the end, you will find your fans play a huge roll in your future, and those who treat their fans well, seem to stick around just a little bit longer.
Check out this video By Ariel Hyatt, CEO, Cyber PR (USA)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UvEHYPMeC2E&rel=0
Hope this has opened your mind, and sparked some marketing ideas and interests!
Gage Funkenhauser
gagefunk@gmail.com
https://twitter.com/#!/FunkenAudio
